


You Bend, I Snap

by lucycourageous



Series: If There Ever Was a Perfect Couple [1]
Category: Legally Blonde - All Media Types, Legally Blonde - Hach/O'Keefe/Benjamin
Genre: Emmett's POV, F/M, Implied Sexual Content, Set During the Wyndham Trial, just a little bit of emmett getting hot under the collar for elle, the bend and snap is a powerful thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:28:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28051659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucycourageous/pseuds/lucycourageous
Summary: "Did you see it?"Emmett's feelings on being introduced to the bend and snap for the first time.
Relationships: Emmett Forrest/Elle Woods
Series: If There Ever Was a Perfect Couple [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2109252
Comments: 7
Kudos: 108





	You Bend, I Snap

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kindlystrawberry](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kindlystrawberry/gifts).



> Yes, I know the title is stupid but it's hard to come up with clever titles okay. I would like to dedicate this to @kindlystrawberry, whose fantastic idea it was to turn this moment from the musical into a little ficlet - I hope you enjoy it!

“Brooke and I…” A pause for dramatic effect. Emmett winced – whatever followed was bound to be bad. “Were lovers.” 

Okay, not bad. Terrible. 

Brooke slumped sideways in her chair in exasperated disbelief while Callahan rounded on her, “He was your lover?!” 

“No, of course not,” she said, indignant. 

Trying to mediate, Emmett raised a hand, “Alright, it’s a set-back, but-”

“For God’s sake, Emmett, it’s motive.” Callahan got to his feet and approached the bench, “Your honour, I request a ten-minute recess.” 

The judge nodded, her expression terse, and the court broke up, the noise of people turning round in their seats and talking interrupted by a jaunty electronic ringtone that Emmett recognised at once as Elle’s. He glanced around at her and she mouthed an apology before jumping to her feet and heading quickly out of the courtroom door. 

“This is unbelievable,” Callahan spat as he returned to their desk, “you’re making me look like a complete ass.” 

Brooke glared at him, “I told you, I loved my husband. Why would I kill him for a pool boy?” 

Callahan snorted in evident disbelief, making Emmett grit his teeth – it was getting harder and harder to put up with the professor and his complete lack of regard for anyone else. He looked at Brooke, making his voice as apologetic and gentle as possible, “Do you think they have anything they could use as proof to back up their claim? Any photos, gifts you gave that could be misconstrued, anything in writing?” 

“No,” she said, firmly, “nothing.” 

“That could be an avenue to explore then – if we can force them to admit that they have no evidence then it’s just hearsay, just he said, she said.” 

He didn’t need to add the caveat that even if it was completely unfounded, even the suggestion that Brooke had been having an affair at the time of her husband’s death would probably still lower her standing with the jury – he could tell from the grim look in her eyes that she already knew that. He ran a hand distractedly through his hair, chewing his lip. The only way to reverse this was to disprove the claim entirely. 

_Great. Because proving a negative is famously easy._

“Emmett.” 

He glanced up at the sound of Elle’s voice and the light touch of her hand on his forearm, and as soon as he saw her, he knew that she’d had an idea – she was practically glowing with exuberance as she slipped past him, her sudden excitement lighting her up from the inside. 

Her fingertips skimmed the desk in front of him, tugging his open case file towards her. Curious, he tilted his head on one side, wondering what he might have missed in there. But Elle flipped it shut – whatever she wanted it for, it wasn’t to read it. 

A sudden lull in the frantic whispers behind him told him that the other interns had noticed Elle’s return. Next to him, Brooke sat forward in her seat, her dark eyes bright and shining – it was obvious that she trusted Elle completely. 

Though she now had the full attention of the entire defence team (apart from Callahan, who was standing a few feet away, somehow indifferent to the gravitational pull that Elle Woods exerted), it was Emmett that she locked eyes with and whose gaze she held as she said, almost breathless with glee, “Watch this.” 

She dropped the folder on the floor, and then…picked it up. 

But that wasn’t quite right, because if all she’d done was pick it up, he wouldn’t be sitting here feeling like he was on the verge of a minor heart attack: dizzy, hot, mouth dry, pulse pounding. 

He couldn’t quite put it into words, but what Elle had done looked more like dancing than anything else: a lithe, sinuous motion that seemed deliberately designed to draw his attention to parts of her that he’d been (unsuccessfully) trying to avoid thinking about for the last three months. 

It was like a switch had been flipped: all of a sudden, his traitorous brain went wild, happily offering up a number of images that he definitely should not be dwelling on in public, like Elle in that bunny costume, all cinched waist and long stockinged legs, or the time a couple of weeks ago when he was working in her dorm and glanced over casually only to catch her midway through the act of changing one shirt for another. Her bra had been pink (naturally), her skin smooth and softly golden, and though he’d jerked his head away as soon as he realised what he was looking at, that one glimpse of her, intimate and fleeting, lingered in his mind for the rest of the evening. 

Yes, those were exactly the types of things he should not be thinking about right now, unless he wanted to deal with a potentially very embarrassing situation that could quite possibly get him kicked off the legal team. 

Elle’s eyes found his as she straightened up, and he almost stopped breathing, his face going hot with the guilty conviction that not only did she know what he’d been thinking just then, but that she also knew about every single dirty thought he’d ever had while looking at her, and possibly even some of the ones he’d had when he was very much on his own. 

That was stupid and crazy, obviously, but he didn’t think he was imagining the faint flush in her cheeks – she looked unusually anxious as she waited for his reaction. Her hands flexed on the file, clutching it close to her chest in a way that made him irrationally envious. 

“Did you see it?” 

Callahan turned, frowning, “See what?” 

“Uh, no, maybe you should do it one more time.” 

Warner’s voice floated from somewhere over his shoulder, sounding almost as dazed as Emmett felt. He supposed he couldn’t blame Warner for still finding Elle attractive, though a jealous, petty part of him definitely wanted to. 

But Elle didn’t even spare Warner a glance, and from the faint thump that followed, Emmett guessed that Vivian was expressing her own displeasure far more eloquently than he could have. 

“Please?” Enid said hopefully. 

Elle laughed at that, and for a moment, Emmett wondered how she would react if _he_ were to ask her to repeat…whatever it was she’d just done. He would die of embarrassment if she shrugged him off like Warner, but what if she didn’t? What if she…

_Christ, Emmett, you’re in the middle of a courtroom, in the middle of a trial. Can we please focus?_

He cleared his throat, “Elle, what was the, uh… I mean, why did you-?”

“Nikos couldn’t have had an affair with Brooke.” 

Callahan raised an eyebrow at her, “And how do you figure that, Miss Woods?” 

Elle straightened up at once, tipping her chin upwards in what was, Emmett realised with a jolt, a perfect imitation of what he did every time he had to address the class for Callahan, “Because I just did the bend and snap in front of him outside in the corridor and got nothing. He must be gay.” 

There was a moment of stunned silence, then Brooke chimed in, her eyes lighting up, “Nikos did leave a Cher CD in the pool house once!”

“That’s ridiculous,” Warner spluttered, “you can’t base our whole defence on the _bend and snap_ , it’s not like it’s definitive-”

“Seemed pretty _definitive_ to you five seconds ago,” Vivian said, in a voice sharp enough to cut through glass. Warner shut up very quickly. 

Callahan considered Elle with narrowed eyes, musing, “If we can prove he perjured himself on the stand, we could dismiss the entire allegation. But if you’re wrong…”

Elle looked at Emmett, clearly seeking his support, and he nodded at her quickly, letting her know he backed her up. He couldn’t necessarily speak for the accuracy of the "bend and snap" as a form of gaydar, but he trusted Elle’s instincts, and there was no doubting the strength of her conviction. Now it was just a question of proving her correct. 

“I’m not,” Elle said, her hands clenching into determined fists at her side, “I know I’m not.” 

Emmett glanced across the room at Nikos where he sat on the stand, finding to his faint surprise that the guy was already looking over at them - perhaps he’d noticed the commotion on their side of the courtroom. Catching Emmett watching him, the other man gave him a smug smile and blew a kiss. 

All of a sudden, an idea sparked in the back of Emmett’s mind, and as they all stood for the judge, he leaned close to Callahan, forgetting to be polite in his urgency, “Let me question him – I’ve got a plan.” 

His boss gave him a brief, assessing look, then nodded, “Fine.” 

It was obviously more of a test than a show of trust or good faith, but that didn’t matter – for the first time since the disastrous attempt to get Brooke’s alibi, Emmett knew exactly what he was doing. He hoped. 

He glanced at Elle as he squeezed out past Callahan, and she gave him an encouraging nod. She didn’t even know what he was going to do, and she still trusted him to get this right. Abruptly, he felt bolder than he ever had in his life, and he told himself firmly that if this worked out, he was going to tell Elle how he felt tonight – no more silent pining. 

God, he hoped this worked out.

“So, Mr Argitakos…”


End file.
